While it may not seem like it from the outside, being an Instagram influencer is practically a full-time job. After all, those that are successful at it are practically they’re own advertising agency, complete with models, aesthetics, and a built-in audience. For the many that attempt to take on being an influencer, it can be difficult to know where to begin with the approach of this being their top priority. However, that’s why we’re giving you a few helpful tips on how to get started below:

Establish A Price Point For Your Audience

A big part of being an influencer is knowing not only how much to charge for your audience size, but for how engaging they are as well. According to Adweek, the average cost per 10,000 followers is around $100, which while that’s a pretty fair rate, also comes with other considerations. After all, as influencers come in all sorts of industries and locales, finding where your target audience lies and how you can sell that to others is key.

To begin, take a look at who your current followers are, as well as what type of engagement you’re seeing with them. For example, if you’re a city-centric account, then your audience will be primarily local; however, if you’re able to show that a majority of them not only like or comment on your posts but actually come out to events, then that’s worth quite a bit to someone that’s looking to get heads in the door. Granted, that’s not to say you should stray too far from the average prices listed above, but you should perhaps pad your budget a bit if it’s justifiable. Remember, being an influencer is all about the numbers, which can be played in several different ways.

Build Upon Engagement

As we mentioned above, engagement is a critical part of building out your price point. While it’s a term often associated with social media, businesses seldom make it a priority to focus on engagement in their day-to-day strategy. However, as noted by Sprout Social, with 80 percent of Instagram users following a business, many of them don’t capture as much as they could. Don’t be embarrassed if you find yourself in the same boat though; engagement can be difficult to establish and manage.

The name of the game with engagement is finding your audience and holding a dialogue with them in a meaningful way. This includes not only asking the right questions but making posts that showcase the philosophy or personality of your influencer brand consistently. A photo editing app can help you achieve this and hone in on that common bond you share with your audience and hone in on that common bond you share with your audience. Over time, this will align with your strategy to add Instagram followers, giving you a well-rounded audience that will start to engage with one another on your page. When it’s all said and done, you not only will have a page others have started to look towards standing alone, but see genuine interactions occurring.

Find Those That Can Afford You

Perhaps one of the biggest struggles a lot of influencers face is simply finding those that they can advertise or partner with. As noted by Small Business Labs, only approximately 26 percent of small businesses have over $1,000,000 in revenue each year. When you factor in how much of that budget goes to marketing, grabbing a little piece of that revenue seems like a daunting task, especially if they’re making significantly less. And if you’re running into the same issues, then improving your sales pipeline is vital.

No matter if you consider yourself to have an actual process for landing clients or not, the first step is to come up with categories of those who’d pay you for posts. As Instagram is primarily a visual platform, the majority of your clients are going to be consumer products or services, which you should try to capture that sweet spot between when a company is starting to bring on significant revenue, but before they can start to afford national ad buys. Additionally, it’s also a smart strategy to search through startups that have a working product out, as well as at least have raised a Series A (or similar level of capital, depending on their industry). As you’re most likely your own sales team, the biggest consideration here is to keep a level of consistency that’s unmatched.

Keep Outreach Consistent

Finally, as it’ll take a fair amount of work to keep business rolling, it’s important to focus on the inputs of your efforts more than the outputs. Unless you’ve developed the clout of having hundreds of thousands of followers, then you most likely are going to be hitting the pavement to find new clients. Furthermore, as influencer marketing is a relatively new practice, it’s going to take quite a bit of convincing for some to get right. And while it might sound like overkill, having a dedicated sales process is imperative for your success.

Set a quota on the number of businesses you need to reach out towards, as well as having a specific schedule for follow-ups. While some people feel they’re pestering a business, that couldn’t be further from the truth, because as noted by Zoom Info, approximately 50 percent of sales happen after the 5th call, proving that being persistent can have its payoffs. Remember, this is all about making being an influencer your full-time job, which might require taking on a full-time schedule. However, doing so can earn a significant amount as your business grows.

What are some ways you’ve been successful in earning more as an Instagram influencer? Comment with your answers below!